As Dave Caolo told TUAW readers a few days ago, Fortune named Apple CEO Steve Jobs "CEO of the Decade" for his phenomenal leadership at Apple and how he has remade four industries (music, movies, mobile telephones, and computing) in the past ten years.

Part of the Fortune article was a collection of rarely seen photographs of Steve Jobs. From the early days with Steve Wozniak, to his recent battles with pancreatic cancer, the photos chronicle the life of the iconic CEO.

Two of my personal favorites in the gallery are a photo taken in 1982 of Jobs and the Mac team having a working lunch as they hammer out the design of the first-generation Mac, and another of a barefoot Jobs meeting with Bill Gates at the Jobs home in Palo Alto to talk about the future of computing for Fortune.

The entire set of posts, along with the photos and video, are a fascinating look into the many successes and few failures of the engimatic Mr. Jobs. If you have a chance, take a look at it this weekend.

Deutsche Bank analyst Chris Whitmore says corporate IT is warming up to the iPhone. In a research note published yesterday das analyst says, "There is growing evidence that the iPhone is making inroads into the Enterprise."

Whitmore thinks Apple will sell 2 million iPhones to big business by the end of the year, some through reimbursements to employees and some through IT department purchases. If those numbers hold, the iPhone will own about 7% of the Enterprise smartphone market in 2009, up from the 2% it controlled in 2008.

What's up with the shift? Whitmore notes four reasons:

• User satisfaction - highlighted by the recent J.D. Power surveys of both consumer and business smartphone users
• Enterprise applications
• The iPhone's level of innovation
• The virtual keyboard - according to Whitmore, the thought that business users have to have a physical keyboard on a smartphone has turned out to be a 'fallacy.'

However, businesspeople might not agree that they don't need a physical keyboard if their first virtual keyboard isn't on an iPhone. UK researcher Canalys has taken a look at touchscreens and future smartphone purchases. The firm finds the ground shifting the touchscreen's way. Of the 3,000 survey respondents in the UK, Germany, and France, 38% say their next phone will have a finger-oriented touchscreen, while 16% say theirs will have a stylus-operated touchscreen.

But a lot of people who have virtual keyboard-only phones miss the physical keys. According to Canalys, 53% of people who own a touchscreen phone say they won't buy another one, though they may have bought the wrong one for them to start. A majority of iPhone and HTC users say they'll keep the virtual keys on their next phones, while less than a third of Sony Ericsson touchscreen phone owners say their next phone won't have buttons.

[via Fortune, The Register]

Is it better to have a lot of something good or a little of something great? If Apple CEO Steve Jobs is any indication, it's better to have both.

In September, Alpha Steve had an estimated personal net worth of $5.1 billion, enough to end up the 43rd richest person in the U.S. according to Forbes' list of the 400 richest people in the states. This week he's up to at least $5.4 billion. If you think that's because of the tear on which Apple's stock has gone over the past few weeks, you're only a little over half right.

According to filings by Apple (AAPL), Jobs owns 5.426 million shares of Apple stock. As of Tuesday night, Apple's stock had picked up 26.39 points since Forbes' counted the 400 "haves." Jobs shares had gained $146 million in value. Not bad.

Disney (DIS) filings say Jobs owns 138 million shares of the happiest company on Earth. Those shares have not had nearly the run enjoyed by Apple shares over the last few weeks, gaining only 99 cents as of Tuesday night. Still, Jobs has so many of them that they've increased in value by $136 million. Not bad either.

Apple's meteoric rise plus Disney's incremental rise equals $282 million more for Apple's CEO and Disney's largest private shareholder.

It's better to have both.

[via Fortune]

Fortune's Bridget Brennan has a bold statement: "Why doesn't Apple make remote controls? You ask: Why Apple? Because if any company could improve one of the world's most user-unfriendly electronic devices, it would be Apple. And then there's this: Apple just may be the world's most discreetly feminine brand." Oh man. We were with her right up until that last statement: remote controls are fairly user-unfriendly, and an Apple remote (other than, you know, the one already out there) would be a thing of beauty. But "the world's most discreetly feminine brand"? That opens up a whole can of nuts we probably don't want to open.

But what the heck, snakes be damned, let's open it up. Brennan says that women drive the economy, by influencing 80% of all purchases, and 61% of all consumer electronics products. And she says Apple is doing great, because in a market that's "dude-driven" (her words, obviously), they've brought elegance and style to their products. She says that Apple products don't need manuals, and that Apple's face-to-face customer service is excellent.

Which we mostly agree with (while even Apple fans have their issues with customer service, they do a relatively good job). But "feminine"? Do guys not like elegance and style in their products? Do they enjoy reading manuals, or using electronics that aren't user friendly? Apple is successful for these reasons, sure, but we don't quite see how that makes them "feminine." Brennan concludes by suggesting that "Apple's success [shows] when you make women happy, you make everybody happy." But we're pretty sure that, in Apple's case, it's actually the other way around.

Yesterday, Megan noted a Fortune story saying that iTunes syncs flawlessly with the new Palm Pre. This, of course, got the water-cooler talk bubbling: "How did Palm pull it off? Will Apple allow this to happen?"

Turns out they already have. A tech note on Apple's website notes the two dozen or so third-party players that iTunes (for Mac OS X, at least) is compatible with, including Rio and Creative Labs Nomad MP3 players. True, many of the models listed predate the iPod, and the tech note itself was last updated a little less than a year ago. But third-party device compatibility with iTunes isn't without precedent.

Daring Fireball's John Gruber pointed to a story by Jon Lech Johansen that says Apple may block iTunes access to the Pre in a future update; Gruber himself said he "wouldn't be surprised if they did." I'm not so sure.

First, let's look at how it works. According to Johansen, a unique USB device ID allows iTunes to recognize MP3 players (including iPods) that it's compatible with. Johansen speculates that Palm is using one of these IDs when communicating with iTunes. If it's an iPod's unique ID, then it will work with iTunes for Windows, too; this is an important litmus test and we don't know the results yet.

I can understand Apple might not cotton to a Palm Pre specifically masquerading as an iPod USB device. Given that, allowing the Pre to freely communicate with iTunes isn't necessarily bad business sense, presuming Palm implements the functionality in a forthright manner (like other third-party MP3 players that iTunes already supports).

Why limit access to the Pre, aside from pure spite? If someone already uses iTunes, chances are they have some quantity of DRM-free iTunes Plus music on their computer. There's no technical reason why the music shouldn't be easily playable on the Pre. One of the upshots of removing DRM in the iTunes store is to facilitate device interoperability. Allow non-Apple devices to play iTunes music, and suddenly Apple has customers it didn't have before.

If Apple chooses to cut off just the Pre, and Palm is following the rules, Apple is unnecessarily cutting a stream of revenue. That's something I don't see Apple doing lightly.

Fortune's Apple 2.0 got a nice little graph up of just where and when the iPhone's hype machine went into overdrive. There's no question it was a gigantic brand last year, but what's interesting is just how manufactured and "by design" each of those spikes are. B on the chart above is the actual iPhone launch, and E and F are the 3G debut and store launch. Fortune relates point A to the Cisco lawsuit against Apple over the "iPhone" name, but let's be real: that was just part of the story of the gigantic iPhone reveal (which took place one day before, not two).

So the real story here isn't necessarily that Apple masterfully created a smartphone that revolutionized the industry and made tons of money doing it, but that they coordinated a hype machine that marched to their tune whenever they wanted. The red line above, as you can see, is Palm, and while there are a few spikes along that line (probably interest in various new products and releases), there's nothing like the excitement and hype that shoots up around a big Apple event. The iPhone is a feat of engineering in itself, but the hype machine behind it is pretty well-built, too.

Morgan Stanley analysts yesterday cut AAPL's price target to $95, mostly citing the weak economy. They said that despite price cuts, extreme interest in the iPhone, Mac users' high satisfaction, and marketshare momentum for Mac sales, the quarter will be slow for Apple.

Blog Notable Calls said it wouldn't have been surprised if AAPL slipped by five points yesterday, but instead the stock gained 34 cents a share before the closing bell.

On a brighter note, Kaufman Bros. analyst Shaw Wu sees promise in iPhone gift cards, according to Fortune's Apple 2.0 blog. As with any gift card, Apple collects revenue from the customer up front. However, Apple can't report the revenue until the phone is activated, which will likely be during the first quarter of next year.

Wu anticipates Apple will sell 6 million iPhone handsets during the company's fiscal Q1 2009, which includes October, November and December 2008. Morgan Stanley analyst Kathryn Huberty thinks Apple will sell only 4 million that same quarter.

In the same Apple 2.0 story, Philip Elmer-DeWitt notes that Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster looked at how many units Walmart might sell, after pricing details leaked on Monday. He conjectures that each Walmart store could sell 1,284 iPhones in 2009, accounting for nearly 10 percent of Apple's worldwide iPhone sales.

AAPL was up by $2.50 or so in midday trading.

Fortune's Apple 2.0 blog has the skinny on why Japan is so hot on Apple lately -- apparently Steve Jobs' little company has seen sales rise 39% in the land of the rising sun, even after a drop the last year.

Why is this? Apple's own report says iPods, Macs, and MacBooks are the culprits -- sales of Macs specifically are jumping up the charts. At the same time, reports are saying that sales of the iPhone have slowed there after a big burst at debut (while sales here are still through the roof).

Seems like there's an upsurge on American electronics in Japan in general. Any of you armchair analysts want to guess why Apple is doing better there?

Apple's quest to replace outgoing iPod and iPhone VP Tony Fadell has run into a major roadblock: a federal district judge has granted IBM an injunction, forbidding former IBMer Mark Papermaster from joining Apple's ranks, at least for now.

The story is a classic HR nightmare. According to a timeline at Fortune's Apple 2.0 blog, once he was offered a "once in a lifetime" position at Apple, Papermaster indicated he was going to resign at IBM. IBM executives then offered Papermaster a "substantial increase" in pay to entice him to stay. Papermaster declined, and quit.

The next day, IBM filed their suit with the Southern District of New York, alleging that Papermaster is in violation of the non-compete clause of his employment contract.

Papermaster claims in a counter-filing that Apple and IBM are in two totally different businesses: The former a consumer products company, the latter a high-end server manufacturer. Uh huh.

Pundit Robert X. Cringely speculates that tapping Papermaster for the iPod/iPhone job was duplicitous, and Apple intends to move Papermaster into the lead position at the newly-acquired PA Semi division once the yearlong non-compete clause of his IBM contract expires.

Apple said in a statement to Reuters that Apple "... will comply with the court's order but are confident that Mark Papermaster will be able to ultimately join Apple when the dust settles."

Let me just say it: we're looking for a few good geeks. Do you have a love for all things Apple, tempered with a healthy dose of skepticism for the power of the RDF? Are you eager to share your favorite tips and tricks with Mac users everywhere? Is your iPhone development mojo so strong that it deserves an iSoapbox? Are you, in short, TUAW material?

If you think you're what we're looking for, why not apply to blog for TUAW? Write about what you love and get paid to do it... seems like a good idea. Here's what we need from you:

A brief biography. Tell us about your history with Apple, how long you've been a Mac user, etc.

3 sample posts written in TUAW's style. One should be a review of something (Mac app or accessory, iPod gear, iPhone app, you get the picture), the second should be an opinion piece, and the third can be whatever strikes your fancy. NOTE: please do not give us links to previously published material in lieu of post samples. We're glad to know about other places your work has appeared, but we need three freshly written and unedited posts.

Your current Mac and iPhone/iPod setup.

Your contact info (email, phone, IM, anywhere else we can find you)

Send this package of "how I am so awesome" to us at apps@tuaw.com as a plain text email; no attachments, please. You have to be at least 18 years old to write for TUAW (sorry, not our choice), but we welcome applicants from all parts of the world -- in fact, we would love to bring some contributors into the fold who are in timezones far away from EST. If you've got specialized Mac interests (scientific computing, video/audio, education), that's fantastic, but generalists welcome too.

Our deadline for this round of applications is Friday, November 7 -- so get down to it!

Widely-read Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster is revising his prior estimate for the quarter ending a week from Tuesday, and his outlook is even rosier than before.

Instead of 4.1 million iPhone 3Gs, Munster expects Apple will sell 5 million of the handsets. Likewise, he's revising his estimates for Mac sales up by 300,000 units, and iPod sales up by 200,000 units.

If he's right, it will mean Apple will have sold 7.4 million iPhones so far this year. That puts Apple well on track to meet its own prediction of selling 10 million handsets for calendar year 2008.

On the other hand, we have Morgan Stanley, who cut price targets for nine hardware companies, including Apple. Morgan cited a "fragile consumer," slower overall spending, and a stronger dollar (the last of which impacts sales abroad for U.S. companies).

This comes after a weak August for Mac sales, which -- in context -- only means that Apple's numbers didn't grow quite as fast as they did in prior months. They still sold 23 percent more Mac units than August 2007, but that was sharply lower than July 2008's 43 percent increase over July 2007.

[Via Fortune, Silicon Alley Insider, and 24/7 Wall St.]

Thanks, Robert!

A month ago, Apple was crowing about selling one million iPhone 3G handsets over its opening weekend. In a month, they've tripled that figure.

According to Fortune and analyst Michael Cote of the (eponymous and nascent, from what I can Google) Cote Collaborative, Apple has already hit the three million mark, with many investors expecting only three to four million handsets sold by the end of the quarter.

Cote is a former T-Mobile executive, who Scott Moritz says has been accurate with his predictions in the past.

It took over 10 weeks for the original iPhone to sell just one million handsets. The iPhone 3G accounts for almost a third of all iPhones sold, ever.

Cote says that meeting demand will be Apple's challenge going forward, as it enters 20 new countries on August 22 -- almost doubling its market presence worldwide. "The demand is so strong it may impact or delay the new countries coming on," he said.

In the "premium" computer market -- at least, for machines sold in brick and mortar stores -- Apple holds its own as number one. For the first quarter of this year, Macs accounted for 66 percent of computers that retailed for over $1,000, according to eWeek.

That's not all: 70 percent of desktops sold at the same price point (or higher) are made by Apple too.

Even though sales at physical stores represent only a fraction of the overall computer market, what's most impressive for this stat is the year-over-year growth. Apple had 18 percent of the premium market in January 2006. That grew to 57 percent in September 2007, and just six months later rose to 66 percent. In the same eWeek article, Joe Wilcox quotes NPD's Stephen Baker as saying "Windows notebooks had 'zero percent' growth year over year [and] Apple notebooks had '50 to 60 percent growth.'"

Of course, overall, Apple makes 14 percent of computers sold at retail. Compare that to Apple's nadir in the late 90s of around two percent, and you can see how the changes Apple made to its distribution and retail strategy over the last decade have really paid off.

[via Apple 2.0]

As part of their feature on Apple we noted earlier in the week, Fortune magazine also has an interview with Steve Jobs that's definitely worth a look. Though frankly a bit annoying to page through, it's chock full of Uncle Steve goodness. There's quite a bit of interesting background on some of Apple's biggest business decisions over the last few years. It's definitely worth a read if you're interested in how the CEO of the most-admired company in the country thinks.

In addition, there's also a story by Fortune editor Peter Elkind on The trouble with Steve Jobs. It comes off a bit like sour grapes in places, but nonetheless is also worth the time.

[via Daring Fireball]

There's a glowing article about Apple at Fortune today. Here was the stand-out line for me:

"Apple's philosophy goes like this: Too many companies spread themselves thin, making a profusion of products to defuse risk, so they get mired in the mediocre. Apple's approach is to put every resource it has behind just a few products and make them exceedingly well."

Consider Apple's product line. There are three laptops, the MacBook, the MacBook Pro and the MacBook Air. Even a potential customer who's never used a computer before can understand the distinctions just by hearing their names.

"MacBook" is obviously the basic laptop. The "MacBook Pro" is obviously a "better," or professional, model and the Air is somehow different than the two. Easy.

Not to pick on Sony, but look at their lineup of Vaio laptops:

1. Vaio UX Series
2. Vaio TZ Series
3. Vaio SZ Series
4. Vaio CR Series
5. Vaio FZ Series
6. Vaio NR Series
7. Vaio AR Series

What? Just reading the names, I can't surmise anything about the differences between these machines. Plus, there are seven models vs. Apple's three.

The same goes for desktops. Apple builds three; the iMac (a name nearly everybody knows), the Mac mini (obviously smaller and, one would assume, lower priced) and the Mac Pro, which follows the pro-level naming convention of the laptop line.

The iPod line is slightly more convoluted (if "convoluted" is even the right word) with four models

1. iPod shuffle
2. iPod nano
3. iPod classic
4. iPod touch

I bet the classic will eventually be replaced by the touch, once the cost of flash drives comes down.

The Fortune article is full of good stuff, so go and read it.

[Via MacDailyNews]